Yet Another Coolant Leak

FCS Event Manager Joined: 04 Jan 2005 Posts: 3680

as it goes, on the subject of cooling, mine is still running hot and using coolant, no leaks now thou, replaced the water pump as that did have a leak, there is no evidence of leaks anywhere now but the cars temp will sit at the 3rd large line and in traffic it will go up a little more, it never gets to where the red warning light comes on but its still hotter than i would like, not changed the thermostat yet as i cant get one of the bolts free, i've rounded off my torx head socket attachment trying to get one bolt undone (the other 2 come out fine)

its used about a pint of coolant since changing the pump just over a week ago.

system seems to have a lot of air in it no matter how many times i bleed it

and the fan is coming on when the temp is just below that 3rd large line and it stays on almost constantly but the temp wont drop below the 3rd line

any clues ?

Spammer Joined: 27 Jul 2004 Posts: 5717

are you sure the temp sender sensor is reading fine ? the temp might be just correct if the fan is kicking in but the temp on the gauge might be wrong due to fecked temp reading sensor may be??

Mr Quoter-vator Joined: 16 Feb 2004 Posts: 7405

well if the fan is kickin in on the mark it is meant to the sender must be ok.

Spammer Joined: 27 Jul 2004 Posts: 5717

aye you are right ,i thought it was meant to kick in just past the 3 rd notch

Site Subscriber Joined: 01 Feb 2005 Posts: 728

Well,

What a bitch of a job that was. 8 bloody bolts, 3 of which are, how can we say, bloody hard to find! Then Haynes says "remove the pully". LOL yeah right! Got the new pump on (Ã‚Â£28 btw, not bad, for the south of England), leak has appeared to stop even though one bolt is still not tight (the sunburn was taking affect and I gave up for the day Rolling Eyes

) Took her for a drive (the car that is) temp went up to the third line, which confused me, came home and the coolant had gone out the expansion tank. I'm guessing the air was just working it's way out. So topped it up, will tighten that nut I missed, and will take her for a spin to High Wycombe ( Sad

) tommorow and see how she does!
This was my first piece of proper car maintainence (I won't count two clutch cable changes) so am quite chuffed I managed to do it!

Site Subscriber Joined: 01 Feb 2005 Posts: 728

She did good. Temp seems a bit high around the third bar, but that may be due to temporary coolant (water). Gonna change that tommorow.

Leak has stopped so hoorah!

FCS Event Manager Joined: 04 Jan 2005 Posts: 3680

hmmmm, so u changed ur water pump and now the temp sits on the 3rd bar, same as mine then. Question

Site Subscriber Joined: 01 Feb 2005 Posts: 728

Yeah. It's strange. Min sits at 2 1/2 and goes up to just around the third line and then drops again. My fan hasn't come on yet but mine's a TD so I'm guessing it has a higher fan cut in point.

I'm like you WN, I'm not that happy with it sitting that high on the temp gauge Confused

FCS Event Manager Joined: 04 Jan 2005 Posts: 3680

aye, before i changed it out it would sit at the first bar, would go up a bit if i ragged it but would always drop back to the first bar.

i can only assume i still have some air in there somewhere.

gonna give it another flush out this weekend and just fill it with water for the mo.

i have some nice ready mixed renault coolant to go into when i have found out why the temp sits so high

Spammer Joined: 27 Jul 2004 Posts: 5717

that air leaks seem to be big pain in the butt ,is not there a way to overcome this without having to fill the water at a 45 degree hill ???

would filling the system from the bottom help at all if that was practically possible Question

Site Subscriber Joined: 01 Feb 2005 Posts: 728

I'm gonna take my car to my grandfather's. His drive is on a 1in 4 hill. So will park it arse up and try filling it.

I'll have to get some of that Renault coolant. Everyone on here raves about it! Smile

Level 10 User Joined: 22 Mar 2005 Posts: 621

What's this about filling the coolant with the car at an angle???? I just assumed mine was sitting high (3rd line) because I've only put water in so far! Do seem to be having an issue with air tho'!

Spammer Joined: 27 Jul 2004 Posts: 5717

Lindsey wrote:

What's this about filling the coolant with the car at an angle???? I just assumed mine was sitting high (3rd line) because I've only put water in so far! Do seem to be having an issue with air tho'!

thats a 16v specific problem lindsey ,they have a lot of airlocks due to the design of the cooling system ,i dont think you would have this on another r19 engine .
my 1.8rt did not ever have airlocks

Level 10 User Joined: 22 Mar 2005 Posts: 621

I do have airlocks, keep having to bleed the radiator!

Posted: Wed Jul 13, 2005 2:46 pm

Bleedin Airlocks, I have em too!

FCS Event Manager Joined: 04 Jan 2005 Posts: 3680

this weekend i will be mainly taking over the local BP garages water pipe on the air machine due to me not having a hosepipe so i can flush mine thru again.

last time i did that the forecourt staff got a little pissed at me, but i told them i had a burst pipe that i was fixing which is why all the nasty rusty coloured water on thier floor and could not move the car until it had cooled down enough for me to attach the pipe lol.

Spammer Joined: 27 Jul 2004 Posts: 5717

why not buy a hose pipe then neo ,they are only a tenner on ebay

Site Subscriber Joined: 10 Jun 2004 Posts: 2317

Doesn't renault charge a fortune for this coolant? Whats so good about it?

Spammer Joined: 27 Jul 2004 Posts: 5717

its a special coolant thats capable of writing RENAULT on the floor when it leaks Laughing

FCS Event Manager Joined: 04 Jan 2005 Posts: 3680

schakal wrote:

why not buy a hose pipe then neo ,they are only a tenner on ebay

because i live on a main road, and its an ambulance route which means u can only park on one side of the road, the other side is double yellows and guess what side my house is on, yep, thats right, the side thats on the double yellows so i can hardly run a hose across a busy street.

HUW - i got my renault branded coolant - 5 litres from GSF for Â£14